Mathematics... is a bit like discovering oil. ... But mathematics has one great advantage over oil, in that no one has yet ... found a way that you can keep using the same oil forever.

There are proofs that date back to the Greeks that are still valid today.

I was so obsessed by this problem that I was thinking about it all the time - when I woke up in the morning, when I went to sleep at night - and that went on for eight years.

Pure mathematicians just love to try unsolved problems - they love a challenge.

I grew up in Cambridge in England, and my love of mathematics dates from those early childhood days.

Always try the problem that matters most to you.

I loved doing problems in school.